Excellent work by Sen. Tim Kaine:
VIDEO: KAINE SPEAKS ON SENATE FLOOR AHEAD OF VOTE TO TERMINATE TRUMP’S SHAM ENERGY EMERGENCY
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) spoke on the Senate floor to highlight the ways President Donald Trump’s war on American-made energy—including through his sham national energy emergency—will raise costs and cost Americans good-paying jobs. Later today, the Senate will vote on legislation led by Kaine and U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich (D-NM) to terminate President Trump’s emergency declaration.
“President Trump took a number of actions on his first day in office, and many of them got a lot of attention. One that didn’t get so much attention was his decision on day one—on day one—to declare that the United States was in an energy emergency,” said Kaine.
“I am proud to stand here and tell you, especially as one who has supported many of the policies that has led to this growth in American energy, that America is producing more energy today than at any point in the history of this nation. America is the leader in the world in energy production, and for the last few years, we’ve been an energy surplus nation, producing more than we consume,” Kaine continued.
Kaine said, “Donald Trump and his Administration are attacking wind projects. They’re attacking solar projects. They’re attacking clean energy projects that aren’t oil, coal, natural gas, and nuclear, and by doing so, they’re reducing supply and likely raising prices on American consumers.”
“There are a number of projects in Virginia, as an example, that benefited from tax breaks included either in the Inflation Reduction Act for clean energy projects or the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for rollout of electric vehicle charging,” Kaine said. “President Trump’s Administration has attacked those projects, has put them on hold, and the Virginians who were intending to invest billions of dollars hiring people to build these projects are now uncertain about what they can do.”
“This would be more than a horrible policy… It would also set a horrible precedent—a precedent that a president of either party can invent a sham emergency and then grab away from Congress powers that Congress has under Article One,” Kaine concluded. “We took an oath to a Constitution that gives Congress certain powers. We should not let the President trample on those powers.”
In the hours following his inauguration on January 20, 2025, President Trump signed a slew of executive orders, including the national energy emergency order, to withdraw support for renewable energy—despite its benefits to America’s economy and environment—and grant his administration new powers to promote fossil fuels at the cost of bedrock environmental laws. Specifically, the emergency will benefit Big Oil by giving his unelected Cabinet officials the power to oversee the accelerated approval of fossil fuel projects, including oil drilling rigs and pipelines, and explore the use of eminent domain to take Americans’ land for the “siting, production, transportation, refining, and generation” of non-solar and non-wind-related energy production.
Last week, Kaine and Heinrich held a press conference with environmental leaders to urge their colleagues to support their legislation to end the emergency.
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